Page:The Collected Works of Theodore Parker Discourse volume 1.djvu/315

268 ligious fanatic, from Mahomet to Mormon, finds followers plenty as flowers in summer, and true as steel. Can no man divine the cause?

Blessed was the Christian Church while all were brothers. But soon as the Trojan Horse of an organized priesthood was dragged through the ruptured wall, there came out of it, stealthily, men cunning as Ulysses, cruel as Diomed, arrogant as Samuel, exclusive and jealous, armed to the teeth in the panoply of worldliness. The little finger of the Christian priesthood was found thicker than the loins of their fathers—the flamens of Jupiter, Quirinus, the Levitical priests of Jehovah. Then Belief began to take the place of Life; the priest of the man; the Church of home; the Flesh and the Devil of the Word and the Holy Spirit. Divine service was mechanism; Religion priestcraft; Christianity a thing for kings to swear by, and to help priests to wealth and fame. But a seed remained that never bowed the knee to the idol. Righteous men, they were cursed by the Church, and blessed by the God of Truth. We are to blame no class of men, neither the learned who were hostile to Christianity, nor the priest who assumed this power for the loaves and fishes' sake; they wore men, and did as others, with their light and temptations, would have done. Looking with human eyes, it is not possible to see how the evil could have been avoided. The wickedness long intrenched in the world; that under-current of sin which runs through the nations; the low civilization of the race; the selfishness of strong men, their awful wars; the hideous sins of slavery, polygamy, the oppression of the weak; the power of lust, brutality, and every sin,—these were obstacles that even Christianity could not sweep away in a moment, though strongest of the historic daughters of God. Men could sail safely for some years in the light of Jesus, though seen more and more dimly. But as the stream of time swept them further down, and the cold shadow from mountains of hoary crime came over them anew, they felt the darkness. Let us judge these men lightly. Low as the Christian Church was in the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth centuries, it yet represented the best interests of mankind as no other institution. Individuals but not societies rose above it, and soared away to the Heaven of Peace, amid